[4] An alumna of Talladega College, and author of four books of poetry and a short-story cycle, Finney is an advocate for social justice and cultural preservation.

[1][2] Finney's father began his career as a civil rights attorney, and in 1961, served as Head Legal Counsel for the Friendship 9, black junior college students arrested and charged when trying to desegregate McCrory's lunch counter in Rock Hill, South Carolina.

[1] Graduated from Sumter High School in 1975, Finney matriculated at Talladega College,[2] an HBCU in Alabama, where she was mentored by poet and essayist Dr Gloria Wade Gayles.

[10] After studying with Dr. Howard Zehr and graduating from Talladega College in 1979, Finney began her artistic career as a photographer.

Finney's targeted result of her independent years was achieved: On Wings Made of Gauze, her first book of poems, was completed in Atlanta.

After publication of her first book of poems, Finney relocated to the Bay Area, where she involved herself with progressive causes, and continued independent work as a poet.

She was recruited to a position as Visiting Writer in the English department at the University of Kentucky (1989–90), by South Carolina-born novelist and poet Percival Everett.

After the publication of The World is Round, Finney was invited to Smith College, in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she served for two years as the Grace Hazard Conkling Writer-in-Residence, from 2007 to 2009.

Finney was also commissioned to write a new poem entitled "The Battle of and for the Black Face Boy" to be presented to the campus community in October 2015.

She has served on the faculty and Board of the Cave Canem Foundation, where she shepherds younger poets in the spirit of her mentorship experience.